"Sugar, Sugar" is a pop song written by Jeff Barry and Andy Kim. It was performed by The Archies, a band formed by a group of fictional teenagers in the television cartoon series The Archie Show. It reached number one in the US in 1969 and stayed there for four weeks. It was number one in the UK in that same year for eight weeks. The song is listed as the 73rd top hit of all-time in Billboard's 55th year anniversary edition. [1]

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Hit version[edit]

"Sugar, Sugar" by The Archies was produced by Jeff Barry, and the song was originally released on the album Everything's Archie. The album is the product of a group of studio musicians managed by Don Kirshner. Ron Dante's lead vocals were accompanied by those of Toni Wine (who sang the line "I'm gonna make your life so sweet"), and Andy Kim. Together they provided the voices of the Archies using multitracking.

When the song was initially released, Kirshner had promotion men play it for radio station execs without telling them the name of the group (due to the somewhat disappointing chart performance of the Archies' previous single, "Bang-Shang-a-Lang", which went to number 22 on the Billboard Hot 100 charts). Only after most of the DJs liked the song were they told that it was performed by a cartoon group. The Archies' hit wound up as one of the biggest (and most unexpected) number-one hits of the year, one of the biggest bubblegum hits of all time, in America thanks partly to association with the hit CBS-TV Saturday morning cartoon series.

The Archies' "Sugar, Sugar" was the 1969 number-one single of the year. A week after topping the RPM 100 national singles chart in Canada on September 13, 1969 (where it spent three weeks), it went on to spend four weeks at the top of the U.S. Billboard Hot 100 from September 20 and eight weeks at the top of the UK singles chart. The song lists at number 73 on Billboard's Greatest Songs of All Time.[2] It also peaked at one in the South African Singles Chart.[3] On February 5, 2006, "Sugar, Sugar" was inducted into the Canadian Songwriters Hall of Fame, as co-writer Andy Kim is originally from Montreal, Quebec.

The song is said to have been earlier offered to The Monkees, although songwriter Jeff Barry denies this.[4] Don Kirshner has said that Mike Nesmith put his fist through the wall of the Beverly Hills Hotel refusing to do "Sugar, Sugar".[5] However, Monkees archival expert Andrew Sandoval has suggested that the band may instead actually have been offered a tune called "Sugar Man", but with the passage of time the parties involved simply mis-remembered it as being "Sugar, Sugar", in large part because it made a better anecdote. Peter Tork claimed in an interview that the band were offered the song "Sugar, Sugar", despite Jeff Barry's denial of this.[citation needed]

Cover versions[edit]

In 1969, Wilson Pickett covered the song in his Criteria Studios sessions. Pickett's rendition of the song was released by Atlantic Records as a single from his album Right On the next year, and peaked at No. 25 pop and No. 4 R&B.

Tommy Roe covered the song, which has been included on one of his greatest hits compilations.

In 1969, the song was covered by German female singer Marion Maerz. Her version featured German lyrics by Michael Holm.

The late singer-songwriter Alex Chilton recorded a cover of the song during the 1970s, which was later included on the 2011 compilation Free Again: The "1970" Sessions.

In 1970, Willie Henderson and the Soul Explosions recorded the song on their "The Funky Chicken" LP.

In 1994, a reggae/rap cover was released by British artist Duke Baysee, reaching number 30 in the UK in September of that year. This version was used in the soundtrack of the 1995 Pierce Brosnan TV movie Night Watch.

In 2011, American musical-drama Glee (TV series) originally planned for the song to be used in the episode,Pot o' Gold, with Sugar Motta,portrayed by Vanessa Lengies, providing vocals. It was then deleted for unknown reasons.

In 2004, pop rap artist Nitty sampled the song in "Nasty Girl", which also contains interpolations of "Sugar, Sugar".

In 2005, the song was sampled in a house/electro version by Beatfactory featuring Massiv4.

Chart performance[edit]

Although official music recording sales certifications were not introduced in the United Kingdom until the British Phonographic Industry was formed in 1973, Disc introduced an initiative in 1959 to present a gold record to singles that sold over one million units.[6] The awards relied on record companies correctly compiling and supplying sales information, and "Sugar, Sugar" was erroneously awarded a gold disc in January 1970 having sold approximately 945,000 copies; the RCA informed Disc that one million copies had been shipped, however not all were sold.[6][7] Nevertheless, following the introduction of music downloads in 2004, "Sugar, Sugar" passed the one-million sales mark.[8]

^Kirshner interview on "Popular Song: Soundtrack of the Century episode Modern Pop"; Ron Dante also clarifies this on a DVD called "Archie's Funhouse," a three-disc set that features Ron Dante in a bonus segment.